Aspirations, Stereotypes and Educational Choices Eliana La Ferrara Bocconi University, IGIER and LEAP DEC Lecture The World Bank – May 6, 2019
Motivation Aspirations and poverty • Standard poverty traps are generated by external constraints: malnutrition (Dasgupta-Ray 1986), credit mkt imperfections (Banerjee-Newman 1991), etc. • Internal constraints may also generate poverty traps, leading to aspiration failures (Appadurai 2004; Dalton, Ghosal, Mani 2014; Genicot-Ray 2016) Poverty low asp. low investment poverty... Stereotypes and poverty • Above mechanism particularly relevant for groups that are negatively stereotyped or discriminated in society. Stereotype threat: anticipate & internalize stereotype underperform (Steele-Aronson 1995)
This lecture • How do aspirations and stereotypes play out in a context where investment has long term consequences, i.e., education? • Study two different potentially marginalized groups: immigrants in Italy and Black South-Africans in SA • Combine administrative & experimental data • Consider different social interactions: w/ teachers & w/ peers Plan of the talk 1. Educational choices of immigrant children in Italy • Aspirations & psychological factors 2. Teachers’ stereotypes Effect of revealing own bias • 3. Peers’ stereotypes • Effect of inter-group contact
1. Goals and gaps: Educational Careers of Immigrant Children (with M. Carlana and P. Pinotti) • In most countries, children of immigrants disadvantaged in labor mkt due to lower educational attainment % of aged 20-29 w/ low attainment Females Males 60 40 35 50 30 40 25 20 30 15 20 10 10 5 0 0 natives immigrants natives immigrants Source: OECD, 2011
Early tracking and educational choices Greater disadvantage in educational systems characterized by early tracking (Cobb-Clark et al. 2009) • Information gaps (Dustmann et al. 2014) • Aspiration traps (Genicot and Ray, 2014; Guyon and Huillery, 2014) High-school choice is an early career decision w/ long term consequences on labor mkt outcomes (Giustinelli, 2011) Research questions • Do immigrant children under-aspire when choosing high school in an early tracking system? • Can we align their aspirations w/ their academic potential? o Evaluate a large-scale program targeting high-achieving immigrant students in Italy Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
The Italian schooling system Stratification of students after 8 th grade into 3 tracks Academic oriented ( liceo ) college • Technical college or white collar jobs • Vocational blue collar jobs • Vocational track worse under several dimensions (e.g., earnings, ex post satisfaction, etc.) Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Fact 1: Educational segregation Immigrant students disproportionately choose vocational track • compared to Italians Need to control for ability use standardized test score in • math & italian (Invalsi) in 6 th grade as proxy for academic potential Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Track choice by quintile of Invalsi score Probability of enrolling in “high track” (Liceo/Technical) Males 1 .8 Immigrant boys “under-aspire” .6 compared to native boys .4 .2 1 2 3 4 5 Test score, 6th grade, quintiles Italians Immigrants Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Track choice by quintile of Invalsi score Probability of enrolling in “high track” (Liceo/Technical) Females 1 .8 No segregation for girls at .6 quintiles 3-5 .4 .2 1 2 3 4 5 Test score, 6th grade, quintiles Italians Immigrants Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Teachers’ recommendations Teachers less likely to recommend high track to immigrants, conditional on academic performance Teachers' Recommendation (Liceo or Technical) Males Females 1 1 .8 .8 .6 .6 .4 .4 .2 .2 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 Invalsi score, 6th grade, quintiles Invalsi score, 6th grade, quintiles Italians Immigrants Italians Immigrants Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
The intervention “Equality of Opportunity for Immigrant students” (EOP) • Program in collaboration w/ Ministry of Education (MIUR) • Target: high-performing students from low-income countries in lower secondary school • Goal: align their HS choice w/ their academic potential Schools • All schools w/ >20 immigrant students in 5 provinces of Northern Italy 145 schools: randomize 70 treatment, 75 control Individuals In each school, the 10 immigrant students w/ highest Invalsi • test score in 6 th grade (only countries w/ GDP pc < Italy) Takeup rate: 79% Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
The intervention Students followed during grades 7 and 8. Two types of activities: 1. Career choice consultancy Information about Italian schooling system • o type of high-schools, job opportunities, booklet translated in language of home country Psychological support based on Social Cognitive Career Theory • 14 meetings during grades 7-8: 5 group meetings, 5 individual, • 3 w/ parents, 1 w/ teachers Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Examples of psychological support activities • Peer education, e.g., video on barriers and self-efficacy of high- school students • “Thinking about your past life, indicate 5 study experiences and 5 other experiences that you have completed successfully… which personal resources helped you doing well in that thing” • “Please find below the professions you selected and indicate which resources are needed (knowledge, skills, personality traits, motivations, ... ) then divide them into “I have it” and “I need to develop it” • “Please list the results you would like to achieve with your job” Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
The intervention 2. Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP) Tutor on Italian language to facilitate studying and learning all • subjects # meetings higher for students w/ lower Invalsi scores in • grade 6 (2 thresholds, though little variation) The 2 components (Career consultancy & CALP) offered as joint • package, not a 2x2 design o “ethics” Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Data 1. Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR) : information on educational career (enrollment, failure rates, teachers’ recommendations, final grades) 2. Italian Agency for the Evaluation of Educational System (INVALSI): standardized test scores in grade 6 and 8, information on family background 3. First-hand data: questionnaire on psychological traits (academic motivation, perception of economic and social barriers on work and educational career) Balance on entry level score & socio-economic characteristics Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Impact: High school choice 11.8% increase over the mean Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Impact: High school choice Closing the gap w/ natives Probability of high-track at the end of lower secondary Males Females .85 .85 .8 .8 .75 .75 .7 .7 .65 .65 Control Treat Italians Control Treat Italians Note: comparable Italian students matched on 6th grade INVALSI score Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Impact: Grade retention Failure 7th or 8th grade Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Potential mechanisms 1. Cognitive skills: Invalsi score in Italian & Math at the end of grade 8 2. Non-cognitive skills: questionnaire on psychological traits 3. Teachers’ recommendations on HS track Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
1. Cognitive skills improve for boys Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
1. Cognitive skills improve for boys Is it because of academic tutoring? • # of meetings for Italian language tutoring (CALP) was a function of Invalsi 6th grade score Z Students in # meetings # meetings sample 7th grade 8th grade Z ≤ 65 64% 22 33 65 < Z ≤ 80 32% -- 33 Z > 80 4% -- -- RDD around threshold of 65 Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Impact of increased # meetings on test scores No significant effect Math Italian Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
2. Non-cognitive skills Questionnaire on a broad range of psychological variables , including info on: • Goals: e.g., which educational level do you want to achieve? • Self-efficacy: e.g., thinking about your ability, do you think you could get a university degree? • Perceived barriers: e.g., do you think the following barriers could be an obstacle to achieving your educational goals: economic barriers, racial prejudice, ideas of the family…? Aggregate into 2 indexes through principal component analysis: • Academic motivation • Perceived barriers Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Treatment improves non-cognitive skills Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
3. Teachers’ recommendations Probability of recommending high track Effect only for boys, who had shown improvements in academic performance not driven by experimenter demand effects Carlana, La Ferrara, Pinotti Goals and gaps
Recommend
More recommend
